


(Can I) Stay the Night?

by Maevi



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, F/M, One Shot, Post-Episode: s04e03 The Final Problem, Sherlolly - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2017-02-11
Packaged: 2018-09-23 14:48:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9662036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maevi/pseuds/Maevi
Summary: Molly had truly had the worst day of her life. After The Phone Call, she decides to finally do something good in her life, and books a well-deserved holiday on the first suitable flight that leaves after work tomorrow.Sherlock, however, has a few things to say to her first.





	

_I love you._

Molly was curled up into a ball in the corner of her couch, two quilts covering her and the tea on the coffee table long since grown cold.  
It was too much. She sniffled, pulled the quilts closer around her. Everything about this day had been too much, and the phone call had been the shit icing on this craptastic cake of a day. Sherlock had been the last person she had wanted to talk to, and quite honestly the last person she had expected to hear from. Partially, Molly thinks, that’s probably why she ended up answering him. He wouldn’t have called if it hadn’t of been important.  
She rather regrets that now.  
Molly still has no idea what happened to preclude the phone call, but she suspected it was something decidedly unpleasant by the desperation in Sherlock’s voice. Honestly she didn’t want to know. She just wants to get away.  
She will get away. Glancing at her laptop screen sitting next to the stone-cold cup of tea, she eyed the confirmation email of a 3-week trip to Thailand. Molly wasn’t entirely sure this was the best of ideas, especially as she had booked it on a whim after that horrendous phone call, but decided to worry about it tomorrow, when she was, hopefully, slightly more clear-headed.

Molly slowly stretched her stiff limbs, emerging from her cocoon of warmth. It’s late, and despite her world being turned on it’s axis, she still has work tomorrow morning. Picking up her mug she walks into her kitchen, throwing away the lemon slice still sitting on the counter, and puts her cup into the sink. Head bowed, heaving a deep sigh, Molly raises her arm to turn on the faucet, but is interrupted by knocking on her front door.  
A very particular type of knocking too. A sequence of knocks in fact, that she had agreed on with Sherlock for situations in which she may be in danger and should only open the front door for him.  
Molly hadn’t been aware that she had been in any danger.

Sighing again, leaning more into the counter, Molly considers her options as the round of knocks begin again, sounding a bit more urgent. She could either A, ignore him until he hopefully (unlikely) goes away (he’d probably just pick the lock) and barricade herself in her bedroom, or B, open the door and face him. She really doesn’t want to face him. It’s probably the first time, she thinks vaguely, the thought of his strange but beautiful face doesn’t inspire some type of warmth. Now the thought of it only brings dread, the heavy sinking feeling at the bottom of her stomach. Probably in the general vicinity of her ileum. Maybe that’s why she feels ill. She snorts, mirthless giggles escaping her as a phantom Sherlock scolds her for making the joke, at the same time as real life Sherlock starts pounding her door. The increase in volume rouses her from her thoughts, and she finally decides to just open the door, if only to spare it from splintering under the pressure.

Stomping over, she unlocks the multitude of locks that Sherlock had insisted she acquire over the years, and yanks open the door.  
“What.” Molly snarls, irritation clear on her face. Sherlock’s relief is more than palpable when he sees her, his arm still raised for another round of pounding the door, and she idly wonders exactly in how much danger she had unawarely been in.  
Observing him as he slowly lowered his arm and just _stared_ she slowly relaxed her stance. He looked absolutely awful. Filthy, sweaty, panting, seemingly slightly delirious and probably running a fever going by the sheen in his eyes and the flush on his face. Molly couldn’t stay angry at a Sherlock that looked this defeated. Instead it just made her sad. Sad for him. Sad for her. She wouldn’t be able to resist him now.  
“What?” Molly repeated, softer this time. It seemed to jerk Sherlock back into reality.  
“May I come in?” Sherlock asked, clasping his hands behind his back. Molly just continued to look at him. “Please?” He added after half a minute of silence, his tone edging towards the begging side of the scale. Molly’s eyebrows went up, as Sherlock rarely ever said that word, but decided to let him in, shifting to the side. Sherlock brushed past her, a bit closer than he usually does, and she had to fight not to flinch away. Sherlock removes his Belstaff in his usual debonair fashion, despite his degree of disheveledness, and sits down on ‘his’ chair, the one that sits in the corner, from where he can observe everything that goes on in the small but airy living space. Molly sits down on the couch, leans against the side furthest from him, shifts her upper body in his direction. Best to have som distance for this conversation, she thinks. Sherlock notices this, but does not comment, for which she is grateful. She usually sits on the cushion closest to him.

They sit in awkward silence, until Sherlock clears his throat, startling Molly.  
“I apologize for any distress I may have caused you today.” He rumbled, not looking at her, and Molly supposes she should be grateful because she’s sure she looks like a flushing guppy, the veritable tsunami of emotions from earlier coursing once more through her body.  
“Distr-distress?! Sherlock, I can’t even, even” She lost her words there, her incredulity too much. Sherlock was finally looking at her though, in quite a bit of alarm. “Not good?” He asked, his voice softer.  
Molly exploded.  
“Not good?!! Sherlock what we went through today was emotional torture!” Molly, having jumped up, started pacing back and forth, waving her arms around in agitation, but not looking at Sherlock. “You said you love me, when everyone knows perfectly well that that would never happen in a, a million years! I said that I’d help you with cases Sherlock but what even was this? What was so important that, that, _that_ had to happen?!” Molly was near on shrieking towards the end, her pain fuelling her anger, tears of frustration leaking down her cheeks. Sherlock was looking at her with wide eyes, and maybe a hint of panic. Molly stood there huffing, now uncaring of her appearance, meeting his stare. 

Several emotions then flickered across his face, ending on determination. Standing up, he swiftly strides over to Molly and wraps his arms around her, pulling her tight against him.  
Molly turns stiff as a board, shocked out of her anger. Had Sherlock ever hugged her before? Had she seen Sherlock hug _anyone_ before? She honestly couldn’t say.  
Just as she was relaxing into the embrace, a queer feeling coming over her at the realisation that Sherlock was acting quite out of character at the moment, he began talking.  
“I thought you were going to die.” His words are quiet. She stiffens again, a chill flowing down her spine. He continues; “She said that there were bombs, and if I didn’t get you to say ‘I love you’ within three minutes you’d _die_.” Straining against his arms to properly look at him, and his pupils, she paused at the haunted look on his face.  
“Why?” Molly simply asked, knowing somehow that the who was unimportant. Sherlock shifted uncomfortably, but refused to let her go. He weighed his words carefully.  
“Emotional torture, as you said.” He finally stated.  
“But why torture me?!” She cried, confusion running rife. Sherlock didn’t understand her confusion, as the answer is rather obvious to him (and apparently many others). He decided however better safe than sorry, and answered as plainly as possible.  
“To torture me of course, as you are the one that matters most.”  
Molly’s heart soared, just as her stomach plummeted. This must be a joke she isn’t getting. Breaking free from Sherlock she turns away from him, biting her lip. Not knowing what to do, or say. Sherlock was not finished though.  
“Because I love you, your pain would hurt more than anything she ever could have done to me.” 

It was too much. It was everything Molly had ever wanted, in a way she never wanted it in. So many things had happened recently. Magnussen, Mary, the Ambulance, his renewed (again) drug problem.

The timing was all wrong. Molly laughed bitterly, hating herself and Sherlock so very much at that moment. 

Seeing Molly still just standing there, the anxiety Sherlock had felt earlier started to return. “Please don’t leave tomorrow.” He began, “I know I haven’t given you reason to stay, quite the opposite really with both words and actions, manipulations, etc.” Molly had turned around at this point and was glaring at him. Sherlock decided to get to the point. “But having just discovered my heart I’m rather adverse to letting yours leave so soon. I promise I’ll be better, I’ll do anything to prove myself, you’re heart-“ Molly put her small hand over his mouth, watching him with a pained expression as he talked faster and faster. 

“Sherlock.” She started softly, “Please. My he- my heart can only handle so much. These past couple of months; Mary, watching you essentially killing yourse-“”It wa-“ “LET me finish, please, I know it was for a case.” Molly glared again at Sherlock who was now holding her hand away from his face. Her glare deepened and Sherlock carefully let go of her hand, a repentant expression on his face.  
Taking a steadying breath she continued. “I love you. I do. And it has killed me over the years, living like this, and that phone call was the last straw. I need time away to get my head on straight, and you need rehab.” She was quiet for a moment, then continued, softly, “It doesn’t mean, however, that we can’t try once I get back, and you’re finished with rehab, if we’re still up to it, that is.”  
Watching his face as she said these things was like watching a roller coaster. Blinding smile in the beginning, pain immediately after, then the slightest glimmer of hope.  
In the end, Sherlock only nods in agreement, and remains silent.

Molly waited for some type of response, shifting her weight back and forth a few times. After several minutes have passed with only soft breathing disturbing the quiet she finally decides to just go to bed. Too physically and emotionally exhausted to continue this conversation, or whatever it is, she starts heading towards her bedroom, sure by this point that Sherlock is most likely in his mind palace mulling over his thoughts, and entirely cognizant that he could be there all night.

Sherlocks hand on her arm stops her though. Turning around she sees his face is uncommonly open, and she’s almost afraid of what he’s going to say next.  
“Could I- Could I say the night?” Molly exhales, noting ironically that for once he’s the one stammering.  
“Is that really the wisest thing to do right now?” She questions back, simply just wanting to go to bed now. As requests go this one is fairly harmless. It’s not like they haven’t done it before, although not with any emotional attachment behind it. At least from his side.  
“I would, like to keep you close, if I may.” Sherlock rumbles quietly. Molly remained silent, searching his face. Sherlock tries to remain stoic, but the anxiety from earlier was sparking right under his skin. And he was so tired.

And so was she. Molly sighs, seeing the poorly masked desperation in the lines of his body. The slight tremor, the unnatural sheen in his eyes. Standing there, practically begging with his whole being. Understanding dawning on her that after the harrowing day he’s had he’s afraid she’ll disappear if he doesn’t have ahold on her. She knows the feeling.  
Shaking her head slightly turns back towards her bedroom door, slipping out of Sherlock’s fingers. Reaching the threshold, she turns back to Sherlock. Seeing him still standing there, the tremor more pronounced, tears threatening, laboured breathing, she takes pity on him.  
“Well?” She tilted her head towards the room, motioning for him to follow, and turns back before she can witness the almost sob of relief from the anxiety ridden man behind her. Molly walked through, leaving the door open behind her, and went to bed. Sherlock wasted no time in following.

He had wasted enough time already.

_I love you._

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first fic I'd written in an extremely long time because of various reasons, so all comments are appreciated, and I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
